


all my fears speed past my listening ears

by theo_aurel



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: 3 years???, BUT I LIKE LINGUSTICS, Gen, I KNOW JONNY SAID NAMES HAVE NO MEANING, a bit of body horror i guess??, enjoy, i wrote this the night before, pretentious meditations of the Meanings of Fear, so this is my (slightly drunk) 2am ramblings, this is my first fanfic despite being in fandom for like, this is not up to date!!!! (mag 144 btw), whoops!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-11
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-26 15:36:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19771246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theo_aurel/pseuds/theo_aurel
Summary: melanie/ˈmɛləni/meaning = dark, blacknessmartin/ˈmɑːrtɪn/meaning = warlike, bellicose





	all my fears speed past my listening ears

**Author's Note:**

> is this good? no  
> is this canon? HELL no  
> is this pretentious? YES   
> am i projecting? you bet!
> 
> enjoy!
> 
> cecil x

To know fear is to speak its language. To understand fear is to live it.

* * *

Melanie is so angry - has always been so angry - at her co-workers, her job, her crew. She knows they are angry at her too. Anger is a human response; she justifies; the brain demands retribution, the eyes demand bloodshed.

She is afraid of her anger. Who wouldn’t be, when a bullet bludgeoned into your body bullies you to hatred, when all you can feel in a hug is how easy it would be to snap their neck, when all you can hear is the _beat-beat-beat_ of blood pounding between your ears.

She knows also how to control it, now. Just barely, but she thinks she can subdue her anger for a bit. Until it becomes useful once more. Anger - and her fear of it - can be useful, occasionally. She took GCSE Science, Melanie knows adrenaline keeps you going until the fight is done. But how long, in actuality, will chemicals carry the carcass of emotions? How long until her body shuts down, for bloodlust can't sustain her body alone. It won't let her go until the end of this fight - whatever that ending may be. It will be a long fight. Maybe it will end with her death.

She can accept that. Doesn't have to like it though.

(Still hopes someone else will die before her. They deserve it more than her. At least she still has a life outside the Archive.)

Melanie supposes she likes - no, not likes, tolerates - her co-workers. Both her and Daisy have a mutual understanding of a (not)life ending beneath your fingers; Basira seemed clever but is merely reckless; Martin was oddly caring (too caring, care that only leads to bloodshed and gore-) but is now aloof.

Well. Happens to the best of them.

She dislikes Jon the most, she supposes, but that she can put aside for the end of the world. He is (or _it_ is) trying, after all.

Tim? He's dead. Best not to dwell on the dead. She can taste the tangy poison of blood when she does.

~~Melanie hasn't thought about Sasha in a long time. Doesn't really want to, anymore.~~

And Helen. Oh, Helen.

If Melanie understands the language of fear, Helen is it’s most fluent speaker. She (not an it - never a mere it, Archivist) paints her symbols into a glistening spiral; inscribes a beautiful tome on the mess of reality. Helen is not afraid. She can’t be afraid - she is fear, and well, Melanie is only human. Probably. Who knows what working at the Archives does to you!

But Melanie is tired of feeling scared. Has been for a long time. It’s exhilarating, fear, but extremely boring. So, before she gets spun too firmly into this mess of terror, she gets help. Goes to therapy.

(If her therapist has ~~eight~~ eyes that bore a little too deep for her liking, or that the corners of the room are dark with what could be shadows or could be spiders, Melanie doesn’t say anything. It’s better than falling to red once more.)

She lives her fear. Rides it out. Sees where this bloodlust will take her.

It’s all she can do.

* * *

_ znalazłbym _

_ ty w pajęczynie _

_ labirynty i mgła _

_ Pokrycie _

Martin, that’s awful! “Mist?” Seriously? Jon could write better poetry than this.

Here’s the thing about working for the Lukases. You get a lot of downtime. So, Martin spends his time between spreadsheets and being traumatised by eldritch horrors writing. He can’t talk to people, but paper will have to do. His plan has to work. He needs them to be safe.

(Granted, he could care less about the others. He just wants Jon to stay alive. Which is getting harder and harder, how is that man so careless-)

Martin is scared, of course he is. And he’s scared of that fear, and the circle repeats itself until it forms a self-destructive web. But, you’re always scared of something, and fear-horror-entity-type-things are definitely a reasonable fear.

He spends most of his time in the Institute. No hospitals to visit, no friends to check up on, no point in going out. It’s safer, somehow, in there.

It's almost funny, how a place that was once so imposing and terrifying (and crawling, writhing with little toothy shapes, his brain supplies) becomes a refuge. The Archive has seen so much death and strife that it's formed a little bubble for him - there's this pain, which he has experienced and survived, and there's the pain that comes with outside. In the Archive, he knows every nook and cranny (he's worked here for long enough) so he knows exactly where Sasha would have been killed, where Jon was stabbed, where Gertrude died, where -

No. 

He can't think about them. 

He has a mission to complete. 

Can't save the world if you're always thinking about the past. 

(Doesn't stop him wondering though, if he had done that, if he had said that, what would have changed? Who would be alive? Wouldn't change anything, probably. Martin never mattered that much.)

He was doing some research a few days ago into names. For poetry - it's fun to mess around with double meanings. His means "warlike," apparently. Doesn't really fit him. But then again, he's never felt comfortable in his own skin (except he does - when he outsmarts people. Best to ignore that.) 

Jon means "gracious," Basira means "wise," Daisy "pearl" and Melanie "dark."

They're all the opposite, really. 

He's not saying Jon isn't kind, or Basira isn't clever, but - Melanie isn't going to the dark anytime soon (hopefully. That would be a problem.) and Daisy? She doesn't seem like a pearl, whatever that means. 

Fear twists you into something you're not. 

Mostly metaphorically, sometimes literally, but it always changes you. 

Martin has always been afraid of something - first his parents, then just his mum, then money, then endless interviews and CVs, then worms. The list goes on. But it was strange, seeing Tim metamorphose from smiles and jokes into rage and hatred. ~~(Even if it was justified.)~~

He doesn't like change. It feels odd, like a spider crawling along your vertebrae, its infinite eight legs tapping out an irregular tarantella. 

Still, the world changes. Lonely extinction draws near, if Peter is to be trusted. Choking dark envelops slowly, according to recent events. Clear swarms are long gone, but hover at the reaches of his conscience, bloodthirsty. 

So, he lives his fear. Goes through the motions of each day. Waits for his opportunity; for his web to join to the statements. 

It's all he can do. 

**Author's Note:**

> yall come chat to me!!!! im ceccilpalmer on tumblr, and if you see me on discord come and rant at me bout smth i need interaction
> 
> (also please comment i need validation)


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